All about the flavor of a small mountain city and the surrounding outback: neighborhood surprises ... wildflowers and nature ... the forest ... people and events ... plus occasional comments on science fiction, music, and the Great Wide World Beyond

Saturday, May 08, 2010

Pretty little plaques

When my daughter was stuck with the agony of moving me & my stuff into my small ALF apartment, she made a selection of art and artifacts from the overload at the house. Among the items that made the cut were these three Mexican plaques in the classic talavera style; they now greet me in my bathroom. And they add three words to my Spanish vocabulary. First is, of course, butterfly.

Now you know what to call a quail when south of the border.

It took a bit more work with the various search engines to verify that venada is indeed a word for deer and not just a particular member of the lepidoptra (i.e., una mariposa). In fact, I would venture to guess that it is the preferred word in Mexico, but not in Spain.

steve -- I took a more careful look at one of the plaques. I would guess that the picture is printed on paper or plastic which is then pasted on one side of a Masonite oblong, after which four edge pieces are glued to the back.

diana -- and it's sufficiently like nevada (snowy) that I got a lot of nevada references when I did my search!